Birmingham City to pay €8m for Afriyie Acquah

English side Birmingham City have slapped in an offer of €8m to Torino for their Ghanaian midfielder Afriyie Acquah, Ghanasoccernet.com can exclusively reveal.

The Championship side tabled the offer late on Tuesday night as they seek grab the experienced player to shore up their midfield and prevent clubs in the Serie A from signing him.

The Italian top-flight are considering the offer from Birmingham as they seek to maximise the revenue if they decide to sell their highly cherished 25-year-old.

Ghana’s leading football news outfit Ghanasoccernet.com understands that Acquah has already accepted the personal terms proposed by Birmingham.

The sticking point remains that Torino must accept the offer by the Blues before they can confidently grab the Ghanaian player who is wanted by top clubs in Italy.

Coach Harry Redknapp has turned to another Ghanaian just one week after Emmanuel Agyemang Badu snubbed his offer to move to Turkey to sign for Bursaspor.

Agyemang-Badu was greeted by Redknapp and Blues director of football Jeff Vetere in Yorkshire and the 70-year-old used Cheikh Ndoye – who would have become Emmanuel Agyemang-Badu’s new midfield partner if he had made the switch to St Andrew’s – to pitch the club to him.

The Birmingham City target Agyemang-Badu completed a surprise move to Bursaspor just days after he was pictured chatting to Blues boss Harry Redknapp and director of football Jeff Vetere.

The midfielder was posing for pictures with Redknapp and Vetere outside the John Smith’s Stadium last week when his Udinese side took on Huddersfield Town in a pre-season friendly.

Redknapp went to watch Badu in action and even used the opportunity to pitch a potential Blues switch to the Ghanaian star.

The 70-year-old’s selling technique included joking: “If anybody tackles you, he kills them”, while pointing to the sky, discussing the prospect of Badu playing alongside summer arrival Cheikh Ndoye in midfield.

The public meeting, and Badu’s step to rule out a move to Huddersfield who were thought to be interested in signing him, pointed towards a move to St Andrew’s.

But the 26-year-old has instead signed for Bursaspor ahead of the new season.

Acquah is seen as the perfect replacement for Agyemang-Badu having played 20 matches and scored two goal for Torino even though he was sent off three times.

The midfielder has spent most of his playing career in Italy as he featured for Palermo, Parma and Sampdoria before joining Torino for €3.1m in 2015.

He also spent a short loan stint with German Bundesliga side with Hoffenheim.

Acquah qualifies for an automatic work permit to play in England as the consistent member of the Ghana national team has 28 caps and one goal.

Courtesy of GHANAsoccernet.com – Ghana’s leading football news website. Click for more news.